Slashdot Mirror
Battlefield Director: Linux Only Needs One 'Killer' Game To Explode
dryriver writes with an except from Polygon's interview with DICE creative directory Lars Gustavsson, who says it would only take one "killer" game for Linux to break into mainstream gaming (something some would argue it already has): "We strongly want to get into Linux for a reason," Gustavsson said. "It took Halo for the first Xbox to kick off and go crazy — usually, it takes one killer app or game and then people are more than willing [to adopt it] — it is not hard to get your hands on Linux, for example, it only takes one game that motivates you to go there." "I think, even then, customers are getting more and more convenient, so you really need to convince them how can they marry it into their daily lives and make an integral part of their lives," he explained, sharing that the studio has used Linux servers because it was a "superior operating system to do so." Valve's recently announced Steam OS and Steam Machines are healthy for the console market, Gustavsson said when asked for his opinion on Valve's recent announcements."
Don't worry, you will be able to boot to a text-mode console and fiddle endlessly with X server dependency hell trying to get a graphical environment going.
I just don't get why all the obsession or importance of making Linux the desktop or Linux the gaming platform. Given the poor maintainability of Linux as a highly heterogeneous platform compared to Windows, this makes even less sense. If the argument is to get rid of Microsoft dominance and influence, then why are the proposed champions even less trustworthy, namely Google and Valve (Android & Steam respectively) who have a vastly worse record of maintaining backwards support for software or hardware.